How do I rewire the jack on a semi-hollow body?

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mjbphotos

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I can see that 1 or both wires have come of the jack on my Epi Dot. What's the easiest way to get this rewired? Pull out the lead pickup?
 
You need some long pliers or forceps...and lots of patience. :)

Use the F-holes to help you get at the jack. No, you don't need to remove the PU.

Unscrew the jack, let it drop, grab the wires with something and pull them out the F-hole.
Solder them back on, then drop the wires and jack back into the body.
Flip the guitar around and use whatever you can to get the jack back through the hole.

You might be able to use some fine copper wire to secure the jack BEFORE you drop it into the body...then use that wire to pull it back up after you've done the soldering.
In some cases, if the leads are short coming from the pots...you may have to drop all the pots too, and pull out the entire harness through the F-holes....a REAL PITA.
I've done it a couple of times....it's doable, just can be tricky and time consuming.
 
No...the jack goes in from the inside...and you screw it down from the outside.
 
Loosen the nut on the thread of the jack
Tie some fishing gut or dental floss round the thread.
Take the nut off and leave it hang on the thread.
Push the jack into the body of the guitar.
Retrieve the jack using a bent coat hanger or similar
Resolder as required.
Pull the jack back into place using the floss.
Partially re-thread the nut,
Cut the floss off the thread.
Tighten the nut on the jack socket.
If the nut just turns on thread and wont tighten use a bent coat wire to stop the jack from turning.

If you need to drop the pots as well make sure you ties floss round each one and tie the strand together to save losing them in the body.

Five minutes.

I have an old quarter inch phono plug striped back to less than the diameter of the hole with the cable still attached that I use instead of floss but I do a load of them.
 
Or how do you feel about playing acoustic from here on out? :D
 
Just follow the instuctions that Muttley wrote out-he's the man!:)
 
This would be a good time to consider replacing the jack with a better quality one.
 
Loosen the nut on the thread of the jack
Tie some fishing gut or dental floss round the thread.
Take the nut off and leave it hang on the thread.
Push the jack into the body of the guitar.
Retrieve the jack using a bent coat hanger or similar
Resolder as required.
Pull the jack back into place using the floss.
Partially re-thread the nut,
Cut the floss off the thread.
Tighten the nut on the jack socket.
If the nut just turns on thread and wont tighten use a bent coat wire to stop the jack from turning.

If you need to drop the pots as well make sure you ties floss round each one and tie the strand together to save losing them in the body.

Five minutes.

I have an old quarter inch phono plug striped back to less than the diameter of the hole with the cable still attached that I use instead of floss but I do a load of them.

Excellent tips, which I have followed to one stopping point: one wire is still connected to the jack. The other is nowhere to be found! (And I can't hear anything loose inside, either.)
I can see 3 wires coming from the pickups - red and black to the pickup selector switch, green to the volume pot. There's a blue wire from the tone pot to the volume pot and another red one (hard to see). There is a grey wire connected to the jack, from the volume pot.
Where might the 'missing wire' be connected?
 
The jack gets its HOT from the pickup selector, and the other connection on the jack is the GROUND, which is common to all the pieces (pots, pickups, switch and jack).

As I originally mentoined...you may need to loosen the pots and pull the entire harness out to see where the wires are and which one is disconnected.

If you have one of the small, tilt-able (dental-like) mirrors on a long handle ...you could use that to see inside without pulling out the whole harness. They often come with small toolkits, the kind computer repair tech use...etc.
 
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